The stone walls whispered.
Not with sound, but with sensation — a low thrumming pressure that clung to the boy's skin like ash. Every step deeper into the Chamber of Bound Silence tightened around his lungs, as if the air remembered screams it was forbidden to release.
He didn't falter. Even with the cursed anklet still biting into his flesh, even with the pain of the brand seared across his ribs, he walked as though the shadows themselves parted for him.
Behind him, Elder Malreth's staff clicked against the cracked floor. "You should feel honored," he said, his voice like iron dragging over stone. "No one your age has ever been allowed here."
The boy said nothing.
He had learned silence long ago — not the passive kind, but the silence of calculation, of listening deeper than words. He could feel it now: the lattice of hidden energies stitched into the room, the layered curses bound into the stone, the ancient script woven into the architecture like veins.
Malreth watched him closely. "Do you know where you are?"
"The Vault of Forgotten Vows," the boy replied, voice low, eyes scanning. "Where the First Contract was sealed."
A faint twitch at the corner of the elder's lips — surprise, or something like it. "You've read beyond your clearance."
"I read what I bled for."
A pause. Then a grunt. "Good. You'll need that arrogance to survive."
They passed beneath a suspended relic — a skeletal jaw hung by threads of black ichor. It still dripped. Below it, a circle carved into the ground pulsed with faint silver light.
"This is where your pact will be made," Malreth said.
The boy frowned. "I thought you said I already had a binding."
"You do. But this… is the second."
His eyes narrowed. "Double-bound?"
"Not exactly." Malreth turned, eyes gleaming beneath his cowl. "We're grafting a Contract onto your curse. Think of it as... tying a blade to a broken bone. You'll bleed every time you swing it. But you'll cut deeper than anyone else."
The boy stepped forward. Something about the circle felt familiar. Not in a comforting way — but in the way a scar tingled when rain was coming.
"I want to choose my Vow," he said.
Malreth didn't respond immediately. He studied the boy again — not just his form, but his presence. His refusal to bend. The dark, deliberate spark behind his calm.
"Very well," the elder finally said. "But remember: the Law of Binding does not forgive poor choices. A foolish Vow is a shackle. A clever one… is a weapon."
The boy stepped into the circle.
And it answered.
The silver lines flared, carving themselves into new configurations, as if recognizing his intent. The relic above creaked, threads snapping one by one.
He felt it again — that echo from before. A whisper in his mind, not words, but pressure. It pulled at something inside him.
His past.
His promise.
His buried fury.
"I vow," he began, voice steady, "that for every life taken by my hand, my body will fracture — but my power will rise."
Malreth's eyes widened. "You—"
"I vow," the boy continued, louder now, "that my strength will be built on consequence. That pain will be my measure. That loss will be my cost."
The chamber screamed.
The relic fell.
The circle exploded into light.
And when the dust settled, the boy knelt in the center — blood seeping from his palms, his brand glowing crimson, the ground beneath him scorched and split.
Malreth stepped back. "You bound your growth to suffering," he said, voice unreadable. "You've cursed yourself with progress."
The boy looked up, eyes blazing with something old and cold.
"I know," he said.
And he smiled.
End of Chapter 4